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Mayahuel {Goddess of the Week}

Mayahuel is the goddess of the maguey plant and of fertility. Protector of mature wombs that turn into life.

From the milky sap of the maguey plant, aguamiel, the alcoholic drink pulque (octli in Nahuatl) was brewn. Mayahuel is often depicted with many breasts to feed her many children, the Centzon Totochin (the 400 Rabbits). The Centzon Totochin were thought to cause drunkenness.

Mayahuel is the wife of Patecatl, who is also a pulque god.
The deity Ome Tochtli (Two Rabbit) represents all pulque gods.

The spines of the maguey were used by ancient priests and nobles for autosacrifice.

(...)

Mayahuel is both the ruler of the eight day, Tochtli (rabbit), and the eight trecena, 1-Malinalli (grass).

Mayahuel is the female divinity associated with the maguey plant among cultures of central Mexico in the Postclassic era of pre-Columbian Mesoamerican chronology, and in particular of the Aztec cultures. As the personification of the maguey plant, Mayahuel was also part of a complex of interrelated maternal and fertility goddesses in Aztec mythology and is also connected with notions of fecundity and nourishment.[1]

Products extracted from the maguey plant (Agave spp.) were used extensively across highlands and southeastern Mesoamerica, with the thorns used in ritual bloodletting ceremonies and fibers extracted from the leaves worked into ropes and cloth.[2] Perhaps the most important maguey product is the alcoholic beverage known as pulque,[3] used prominently in many public ceremonies and on other ritual occasions. By extension, Mayahuel is often shown in contexts associated with pulque. Although some secondary sources describe her as a "pulque goddess", she remains most strongly associated with the plant as the source, rather than pulque as the end product.[4]

Mayahuel has many breasts to feed her many children, the Centzon Totochtin (the 400 Rabbits). These are thought to be responsible for causing drunkenness.

Story and Origin of Mayahuel:
According to Aztec myth, Quetzalcoatl and Mayahuel were fleeing tzitzimime (star demons) and tried to disguise themselves as the branches of a tree. Mayahuel was recognized, however, and the tzitzimime tore her to small pieces. Quetzalcoatl buried the pieces which in turn sprouted into the first maguey plants. These are then turned into pulque, an alcoholic drink used by the Aztec in their religious rituals.

Family Tree and Relationships of Mayahuel:
Wife of Patecatl
Mother of Centzontotochtin, an innumerable group of rabbit gods of drunkenness whom she fed through her 400 breasts, all delivering the alcoholic drink made from agave. Each of the Centzontotochtin are responsible for a different sort of drunkenness. For the Aztecs, "400" was the number they used for anything they considered innumerable.

Mayahuel was the Aztec goddess of maguey, as well as one of the protectors of fertility. This deity played an important role in ancient Central Mexico, since it is associated with the origin of pulque.

Mayahuel Myth
According to the Aztec myth, the god Quezalcoatl decided to provide humans with a special drink to celebrate and feast and gave them pulque. He sent Mayahuel, goddess of maguey, to the earth and then coupled with her. To avoid the rage of her grandmother and her other ferocious relatives the goddesses Tzitzimime, Quetzalcoatl and Mayahuel transformed themselves into a tree, but they were found out and Mayahuel was killed. Quetzalcoatl collected the bones of the goddess and buried them, and in that place grew the first plant of maguey. For this reason it was thought that the sweet sap, the aguamiel, collected from the plant was the blood of the goddess.

A different version of the myth tells that Mayahuel was a mortal woman who discovered how to collect aguamiel, and her husband Pantecalt discovered how to make pulque.

Mayahuel Imagery
Mayahuel was also defined as “the woman of the 400 breasts”, probably referring to the many sprouts and leaves of maguey and the milky juice produced by the plant and transformed into pulque. The goddess has many breasts to feed her many children, the Centzon Totochtin or “the 400 rabbits”, who were the gods associated with the effects of excessive drinking. In codices, Mayahuel is depicted as a young woman, with many breasts, emerging from a maguey plant, holding cups with foaming pulque.